ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION - IT'S NOT JUST WRONG, IT'S INSULTING

We all have ancestors who came to America, some willingly, some not so much. We, their descendants, might be native born but our roots go back to the old world. Peggy Noonan talks about her roots in her column "The American Way."

She tells of her grandmother who spent her first night in America alone on a park bench in New York City. How in two generations her family has gone from sitting on that park bench to sitting in the Oval Office and talking with the President of the United States. Peggy reminds us that all we have now, is built on the foundation of our immigrant ancestors. What we are now, we owe in great part to them. Quote:

Here is what is true of my immigrants and of the immigrants of America's past:

They fought for citizenship. They earned it. They waited in line. They passed the tests. They had to get permission to come. They got money that was hard-earned and bought a ticket. They had to get through Ellis Island or the port of Boston or Philadelphia, get questioned and eyeballed by a bureaucrat with a badge, and get the nod to take their first step on American soil. Then they had to find the A&S.

They knew citizenship was not something cheaply held but something bestowed by a great nation.

Did the fact that they had to earn it make joining America even more precious?

Yes. Of course.

Noonan goes on to discuss the current chaotic state of immigration:

We all know it is so often so different now. Perhaps a million illegal immigrants come into the United States each year, joining the 10 million or 20 million already here--nobody seems to know the number. Our borders are less borders than lines you cross if you want to. When you watch videotape of some of the illegal border crossings on a show like Lou Dobbs's--who is not a senator or congressman but a media star and probably the premier anti-illegal-immigration voice in the country--what you absorb is a sense of anarchy, an utter collapse of authority.

It's not good. It does not bode well.

Every illegal immigrant is a slap in the face to our ancestors who worked to come here the right way. Every footstep that crosses our borders illegally demeans the American Dream that was earned by those who came here to become Americans, not use America. Until we get a firm grip on our borders, every day that passes is an insult to our heritage.